Technology Can Byte You At Times . . . By Director Wayne Hall

December 24, 2007

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Technology . . . it has delivered us some marvelous things, but boy, does it present some headaches at times. For as long as I can remember (and I will admit to getting on a bit now), technology advances have always been accompanied with a promise of efficiency . . . more bang for the buck. During my early time at school back in the 70’s I remember discovering the power of calculators and being told by my teacher that by the year 2000 we’d all be working just a few days a week - on full pay of course - while these “powerful new machines” did our work for us. Well that time is here . . . and if anything we are all working harder, driven by the very technology that was to free us up. Nice one Mr Stanwell . . .

Of course, it is not that technology is new, it is more that it is now so much more accessible - and it comes with an expectation that it will speedily and continually evolve. Significantly, digital technology (the bits and bytes of the world) has allowed so many more developers of all shapes and sizes to enter the market with “solutions”. We’re all just a PC away from being a developer; the opportunities are fantastic, but so are the pitfalls.

Let’s ponder our own business music market. Whether you find yourself developing or sourcing a product for this market, the challenge associated with selecting just the basics - the appropriate music format, an operating system, a software code and hardware specifications - can be overwhelming. Furthermore, you can guarantee that as you work your way down the timeline of getting your product to market, you will be sidetracked by the appeal of newly emerging product and technology advances - always tempting you to review your own approach and add more features - thus “blowing out” the delivery date.

I have experienced this state first hand, and (hopefully) learned my lesson. But as I write I am aware of a number of parties - clever, experienced people - who are trapped in the technology cycle to the point where they cannot commit to a product release deadline. In fact, the process of creating or sourcing the product has become the focus (not the outcome of getting the product to market), and every decision to add new features is rationalized on the back of “we can’t go to market without it”.  It’s a great way to lose a lot of time and money, and it makes me wonder if software developers have reached the status of lawyers.

(So we can all feel better, examples of this situation exist in all markets. Try parking your car in different council areas of Sydney and you will encounter our new age parking meters, all running different user interfaces, different communications software and accepting different combinations of payment methods. It is incredibly confusing, and interestingly, is a result of what many economists believe is an efficient open market. Maybe it is, but at times I wish our various levels of government would just step in and legislate that everything from parking meters to the compatibility of mobile phone accessories were standardised. I suspect it would save billions globally. But I digress…..)

The state of the “digital” juke box market provides a great example of this scenario. Within this market we are yet to “settle” on a video format (everything from MP1 to Mpeg 4, WM9) while there is always a better format or compression algorithm “just around the corner”. The result is an incredible mix of technology in the market - even the newer version jukes from the same manufacturers run formats which are incompatible with their earlier versions.

Managing this requirement presents a significant challenge for a content supply business like our own. Effectively, if we are to service the market as we would like, we either have to (i) attempt to hammer in place a standard format by advising that we will only support that format, or (ii) come up with production processes which efficiently support the supply of multiple formats. As much as I would love to gather all of the juke box manufacturers into one room and agree on a format, this just isn’t going to happen. Oh, for the good ol’ days when music systems required just a CD for audio and VCD for video.

So, as a neutral content supplier we are left with the multiple format supply model, and in order to support this we need to take advantage of the latest technology developments (of course!). Currently here at SBA we are building a production process “pipe” which will allow us to ingest digital media, classify it, store it in a premium format, and generate programs for the application format. The investment to create this will be significant, but once in place, we are confident we will sit as a benchmark business globally) in the terms of our capacity to supply content.

The project is in response to our client requirements and is well underway. It will take the best part of a year to finalise . . . assuming, that is, we don’t get too distracted by emerging technology along the way . . .

Thank you for your support during 2007. I must say, whenever I feel business is a little tough, I reflect on the conversations I have had with emerging artists over the year and what they have to go through to build their business, and I stop feeling sorry for myself. (And if it wasn’t for the artists . . .)

Here’s to a great start to the New Year and plenty of time to listen to your favourite music . . .


Wayne Hall
Director

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